


The ghosts of midwinter

by EnlacingLines



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Cute, Established Relationship, Eventual Fluff, First Kiss, Getting Together, Love Confessions, M/M, Memory Loss, Post War, alternative ending, but Sylvain doesn't remember that, sylvix - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-29
Updated: 2019-10-29
Packaged: 2021-01-08 02:27:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,567
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21228266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EnlacingLines/pseuds/EnlacingLines
Summary: Sylvain appears as if by magic, having been missing without a trace for three days.And he returns with a part of him missing.A memory loss Sylvix story





	The ghosts of midwinter

**Author's Note:**

> A huge thank you to my wonderful beta Audrey for looking through this! 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy :)

Sylvain appears on a frosted Tuesday morning, when the air is so dense with fog he seems like a ghost on the moor, stumbling but smiling a little as he makes his way to the gates. 

No one is quite sure how he’s joined this way; the moor is a wreckage that years without battle has not healed, the months of relative peacetime not enough to start regrowth. It’s untamed, dangerous with mines both man made and magical, and must have been excruciatingly cold. Yet he is only mildly splattered in mud, hands only just shaking with the midwinter chill, and otherwise unhurt. 

At least, this is what Felix can piece together from what Ingrid managed to recall with a dazed and yet frantic tone. For the universe, after all this time, is still as brutal as ever and he was not there, was miles away for reasons inconsequential and half forgotten. 

For Sylvain appears as if by magic, having been missing without a trace for three days. 

And he returns with a part of him missing. 

* * *

They manage to reach Felix with a message less than an hour after he arrives. But it takes him almost three of riding to return, and the burn of the wind on his face makes his eyes water, keeping him pushing despite the pain. His mind empties into a single, obsessive focus of listening to the beat of hooves on the ground, a fading and blocking of the senses he hasn’t had to use in many moons. 

Ingrid is waiting as he stables his horse, her back straight, face grave. He stamps his feet as he walks to meet her, feeling in his limbs vanished and hands curling in his gloves as he tries to restore blood flow. She speaks unprompted, which is good; he doesn’t know exactly what will come out of his mouth if he’s given free reign. 

“He’s not hurt, don’t worry. We’ve kept him in the infirmary anyway as it’s...well, it’s confusing for everyone really,” she says, stumbling on an explanation. 

The warmth of the manor seeps into his bones as they cross the threshold, but the chill has already invaded in his chest as he holds his arms crossed. 

“You mentioned memory loss,” he states, voice far more level than his head feels. 

Ingrid keeps pace with him, but does not reply immediately. A bad sign, and the chill bites, frost in the making. 

“He thinks we’re still fighting.” 

Felix stops. He feels his hands start to shake with something other than cold, and clenches them by his sides. Ingrid stops on the stairs before him, expression strained. 

“That’s not possible,” Felix finds himself saying, fleeing into denial as a defense. 

“We’re trying to work out what’s happened, but he doesn’t remember anything. Not the war ending, not anything we’ve done in...over a year? It’s unclear exactly how long, he’s a little confused but...it’s just gone,” she says, arms rising and falling by her side uselessly. 

Felix swallows. There’s an unsaid continuation hanging between them, and the brunt of it forces the shaking back into his limbs. 

“He doesn’t remember us,” he says, to himself more than anyone, looking down at the stairs as if can smash them to pieces with his fists and use them as ammunition to fire into the heart of this hurt. 

But he can’t, so instead he wrestles with these emotions - but not so well enough to avoid the hug Ingrid brings him into, tentative and slow, urging him closer like she’s always done, to morsels comfort that he’s only just learning how to receive once more. 

It takes him a while to hug her in return. 

* * *

Peacetime makes him feel like he’s living with ghosts; thinks he sees images of the dead in places he once visited, remembers snatches of conversation from student days which rings hollow in this new world, walks through hallways destroyed by war. 

But the ghost of Sylvain from the past is more present when he enters the infirmary than any of these, so stark and changed it sends him reeling back to almost a year in the past. 

At a village festival 3 weeks ago, Sylvain had drunkenly made the local healer laugh when he wouldn’t stop repeating how much he loved Felix’s hair. Now, he’s trying to woo her, Felix can tell by the posture and his gaze, that look in his eyes which he’s not seen in so very long. 

Mercedes is near though, and she smiles at the two as they enter, but holds up her hand as to not disturb what’s happening. A blue aura of some sort of spell is emanating from her hand, and she nods as Sylvain switches his attention between the two of them, although his face takes on a certain practiced expression when he talks to the other healer. 

Mercedes finishes, and turns her attention to Felix and Ingrid, blocking Sylvain as she approaches, although he can see the shift of his back as he turns around. As she reaches them, Mercedes offers a grave smile as she speaks. 

“It’s magical in nature. But not anything I’ve seen before, My guess is it’s an after effect,” she says. 

Felix furrows his brow, vaguely recalling the term. “Residue from a spell?” he questions. 

“Yes, possibly a combination of some powerful remnants. It’s happening all over, what with all the magic that’s leaking into the world,” she says with a sigh, her tone reflecting Felix’s thoughts. 

That churn of guilt in his centre, that voice which tells him he has done nothing but harm and hurt in years. All for a greater good that has still not come to pass. And even as time flows by, and repair begins, it’s still achingly slow with many hurts along the way. 

“I’ll need to look into it more. But for now, we need Sylvain to lead us. Don’t tell him anything he doesn’t know, don’t answer questions on details. He knows where he is, the date and the fact that war is over, we couldn’t not tell him. But anything else...until we know the extent of the damage I don’t want to force his mind in a direction it can’t take,” she explains, primarily looking at Felix. 

He swallows, and Ingrid makes a frustrated noise. 

“Is that really necessary? Isn’t it best to help him remember as quickly as possible?” she says, practical as ever. 

But Mercedes shakes her head. “I don’t want to inadvertently make it worse or make him unwell if it’s all too much. Just give me a little time to investigate, I promise it won’t be long,” she says. 

He can feel Ingrid about to argue, but Felix nods. “Okay. We don’t want to hurt him further,” he says, and hopes his tone was as even as he aimed it to be. 

Both his friends seem surprised, but Mercedes recovers quickly. 

“Thank you, Felix. Tomorrow, I’ll have something for you. But for now, you should talk to him. I’ll keep watch of him here overnight, in case there is a problem,” she says with a smile. 

Felix, absurdly, wonders how he’s going to sleep knowing Sylvain is here, in the same building, but not with him. Never-mind the fact he’s spent most of his adult life in a similar situation, he now is so used to sharing a bed with Sylvain that the thought of spending the night alone without the necessity claws at his insides. 

Utterly ridiculous, but cuts sharply all the same. 

Mercedes and Ingrid move away, and he’s sure they mentioned what they were doing, but it’s not registered in his mind. Therefore Felix remains, standing awkwardly and looking towards Sylvain, who now seems to be peering around the room in somewhat confusion. For if his memories really are that scarce, he won’t have been here yet. As he moves, he catches Felix’s eye, grins and waves. 

_ It’s not the same _ , is the first thought that flies through. For Sylvain doesn’t wave at him, he tips his head and smirks with his eyes, daring Felix to ignore him, which he does every time until Sylvain gives in and comes to  _ him _ , with an arm around his waist, or draping over his back or-

It’s not the same. For this is no longer  _ his _ Sylvain, he doesn’t remember ever being so. 

He walks over, studying Sylvain’s face carefully. Ingrid says he isn’t hurt but he doesn’t look good, either. His eyes are rimmed with darkness, almost sunken in, skin on the sallow end of pale. His lips are cracked, must have bled at some point and he is clearly exhausted by the way he holds his body. Felix knows this, has watched him collapse under his own tiredness before, his manner now screaming he is close to that. 

And Felix knows exactly how to get Sylvain to sleep, how to make him comfortable and keep the nightmares at bay. But all of that knowledge is useless now. It makes him far more awkward than usual, and he ends up standing with his hands on his hips almost looming over Sylvain, which is a feat in itself. 

“Hey, Felix. Seems I’m missing...a lot,” he says with a chuckle, rubbing the back of his head and mussing up his hair. 

Felix instantly wants to smooth it over for him. Which is not helping. 

“Apparently. What do you last remember?” he says instead, trying to tune into the same mode of Felix from the past. 

Sylvain pauses. “It’s hard to describe. It’s not all...the same? Or clear? I remember bits and pieces of different times but I can’t really tell what belongs when. A lot of the war just blends,” he says, making a face. 

Felix doesn’t show the wince he wants to make at that, so moves from foot to foot, before sighing heavily. He has no idea how to behave. 

“Come on, sit down. Don’t pace like that, you’re making me dizzy,” Sylvain says, chuckling, and Felix stops moving. He glances around, then takes the nearest chair, glad that the infirmary is practically empty. 

  
A year after victory will do that, he supposes. 

He sits at what he thinks is an appropriate distance, although he honestly cannot tell. He’s lost all sense of spatial awareness when it comes to Sylvain. Somewhere along the line he lost the ability to enjoy touch, held himself at distances until slowly, he began to thaw, Sylvain an integral aid in that. So often, Sylvain is the one who closes gaps; curls arms around him, shuffles chairs closer, initiates kisses. Not all the time to be fair, but more as Felix still hasn’t grasped how it works, still feels his head spin in the newness of how and where and when. 

Now he finds he doesn’t remember how to keep a distance either. For he longs to take Sylvain’s hand, to feel that grounding of calloused palms in his own. He spent so many years adding distance that having it slowly taken away, only to be forced on his all of a sudden makes him lost, in a way that he hates being. 

In a way then, he is thankful for Ingrid and Mercedes returning. Ingrid sits next to him, Mercedes on the other side, the spell from before colouring her palms as she slowly goes through a series of questions which Sylvain answers, with varying degrees of success. 

He looks at the three of them as he speaks, clearly attempting to gain confidence from their reactions. Felix leans back and just observes, Ingrid taking the role of prompting or adding in parts as needed, while Mercedes concentrates on working out whatever she needs to know of his condition. 

It’s established in about an hour that the following is the new reality: Sylvain’s memories are strong until about a year and a half ago, at the tail end of the war. From there things become difficult. His mind is either blank, pieced together between fragments and what seems to be guesses, and some parts are just wrong: events that never happened he swears are true. Sylvain is also exhausted and hurting, recalling some memories obviously causes physical pain. 

And he has no recollection of being with Felix. For they’ve been together seven moons, and nothing of that time period seems to have survived. 

“You should rest now. I will look at this overnight, and we’ll be able to think of what to do in the morning,” Mercedes announces, and Sylvain immediately looks relieved. 

Ingrid stands, but not before giving him a hug, squeezing him so hard he winces. As she pulls away, Sylvain’s eyes drift to Felix. There’s an odd pause, where he doesn’t know what to do, fights internally with his need to pull the man he loves who is clearly hurting closer, to allay the obvious pain. 

But he doesn’t. 

“Good night,” he says, and Sylvain’s eyes flick away, then return in a second. 

“‘Night.”

It’s all that can be said, so Felix takes his leave, muscles jittering with the urge to train for the first time in a while. Another ghost to have been resurfaced. 

* * *

Love does not come easily to people like them. Everyone Felix knows has twisted versions of romance, things dark and creeping under the surface and in plain sight. They make it work through willpower, time and shared understandings that bind them all together, but all of them have less than heroic love stories. 

His and Sylvain’s begins near an end. On an ambush that should not have occurred under the guise of peace, but famine and war torn people are unpredictable in their desperation, and with no enemy to blame any longer, they will seek the nearest target. 

Which is how he ended up with a stab wound in his gut, lurching towards his friends as Sylvain ran faster than he should be able to his heavy armour. Healing magic is fantastic, but that requires a healer near you, and this had not meant to become a life or death situation. So while Ingrid ran for Mercedes, Felix finds himself lying on his back, blinking away tiny lines of grey that continued to swim across his view of the clear, blue sky. He is pretty sure they weren’t meant to be there. 

“Oh no you don’t hey. Come on, Felix. You are not passing out now. Don’t you dare.” 

Felix thinks he laugh. A wet sensation and his chest shakes anyway, and as he does, a mop of red hair comes into view. 

Pretty. So pretty. All askew and windswept, eyes clear and deep, face close to his. Just Sylvain and the sky, nothing else to worry about. Although…

“Can’t feel my toes,” he says, and again, it’s wet, mouth filling with liquid that trickles down his chin. 

“Not a problem, I can reliably inform you they are still there. Okay, this is going to hurt,” he says, and his head moves away, blocking out the sky but-

Felix knows he screams something incoherent as his entire body seizures in pain. It’s followed by a whiting out of all the senses, just a flash of numbness that takes over in the aftermath. 

The sky thought appears again, as strangely, does sensation in his limbs. This time, he cannot see Sylvain, but he can hear him, saying something right in his ear, meaning he must now be lying on Sylvain rather than the floor. He’s not sure what the words are, for he has somehow lost language comprehension along with blood. He can feel Sylvain though, a hum of life and stability that seems more real than anything. 

“You’re warm,” he says, and Sylvain stops speaking for a moment. 

“I’m wearing armour, I don’t think that’s possible,” he says, and it’s so close to his ear that he bangs their heads together when he shakes his head. 

“Warm. Can feel it. I like it. Stay warm,” he mutters, and his body rises then falls with Sylvain’s deep inhale. 

“I think you’re just cold, Felix. Hold on, they’re on their way,” Sylvain says as he adjusts them, tiny stabs of pain floating through Felix as Sylvain somehow manages to wrap an arm around him. 

It feels nice, like floating, but being grounded at the same time. Or it would if Sylvain didn’t continuously keep talking or moving slightly, nudging him away from the serene escape. 

“Fuck off,” he mutters eventually. 

“Nope, sorry, you have to stay awake. I’ll hug you, but you have to stay awake,” Sylvain replies and laughs, which again aggravates his wound. 

“I’ve been stabbed, let me sleep,” Felix says, and his head is starting to ache a lot now, it’s not fair. 

“I promise they’re coming, okay. I know it hurts. You have to stay awake though, Felix. No passing out. I don’t plan on dying today, so you aren’t allowed to either,” Sylvain says, and Felix’s eyes open again, the world blurry but still there. 

“This is a bad hug,” he complains, and Sylvain laughs loudly. It’s a nice feeling. 

“If you stay awake, I’ll give you a better one,” Sylvain says, and this time, he places a gentle kiss next to his ear as he finishes. 

So that’s how they start, a direct stepping stone into where they are now, as Felix stares at the ceiling in his room. It’s so very cold today, the night starting to wane but the sun doing nothing to bring warmth to the sky. 

Sylvain runs warm, while he is at a constant state of frozen even in the summer months. But Sylvain is not here, so Felix is simply shivering in blankets and layers of clothing until he can stand it no longer. He rises and adds on even more layers, and leaves the room in search of anything warmer. 

His search is eased when he passes Mercedes on his way. 

“I was just going to make some tea, would you like to join me?” she offers. 

Tea involves warmth, so he agrees, and finds himself seated by a fire and slowly thawing a few minutes later. The steam curls from his cup as he uses it to heat his hands, all white with terrible circulation and dulled nerves. He watches the fire. Watches it consume kindling without care, eyes stinging a little from the fumes. 

“I don’t know how to reverse it.” 

He almost feels that coming. Like a vice around his soul, it’s been in the wings since he first heard it, first realised Sylvain could not remember. He breathes in smoke then looks back at her. 

She’s studying him, eyes wide and kind but severe in that way he thinks they all seem now, so much further from what they were when they first met. This is not the first tragedy, not the first loss. He wonders though, just how many they truly can endure. 

“What do you suggest?” he says. His voice is level, neutral. Good. He is not shattered for now. 

She sighs heavily. “It’s not truly magic so there is no reversal, but it is a spell effect. So perhaps some magics which aid with memory and learning will help him. Ideally, we’d need him to remember on his own. I’d suggest prompting him, showing him objects or places of importance. It may come back on it’s own. It may never come back. I’m sorry I can’t help any more,” she says, and truly, he hears the sorrow. 

He takes a sip of his tea, exhales as warmth hits his chest. 

“Then that’s what we will do. It’s all we can do,” he replies. 

Mercedes nods, and for a moment he is sent back to the past, when she first learned her craft and would rise to the challenge in the classroom. 

“I think he’ll remember. We don’t forget love,” she says, and Felix feels the cracks in the ice begin to form. 

“We’ll see,” he says, taking another sip of tea he cannot taste. Hope is not a thing he has ever had spades of, and he thinks the little he has, he used up years ago. 

Mercedes looks as if she wants to say more, but refrains, leaving Felix to his tea and his fire. They came here for a quiet life, all of them being dragged occasionally into bits and pieces, and this is no exception. Staying in one place still seems too much of a challenge, with nowhere without a past or a trigger point. This is one place they are staying in for now, one abandoned house they can reform as a hospital to help citizens. 

A quiet life. Laughable.

* * *

Ingrid goes into teacher mode; it would be terrifying if he hadn’t seen this before. She’s determined to make sure Sylvain remembers as much as possible, and Mercedes is just as ready. 

Felix though, can’t seem to reach that. As the frosts spread, everything within seems colder, and his mind moves as sluggishly as the rest of him. He stays away for a few days, just a few days he tells himself. He needs to steel his nerves against this past Sylvain who is not the man he loves. 

But in his spare time he chases ghosts of those beginnings. Mercedes says that prompts may help, but can’t very well stab himself and ask for a hug. Strictly speaking though, that’s not how their relationship started, merely a catalyst which lead up to it. 

So maybe there is something else he can do. Sylvain gradually looks better, or at least healthier. He laughs more, has that tilt of his chin and the lean of his frame which are natural twists of his body in a right mind. Felix says hello, sees him in passing, but doesn’t spend too much time with him, trying to work out what it is he can or should do. Ingrid has got him doing work of some sort, which she claims helps when she drags Felix out of his solitude each evening. 

“He keeps asking about you,” she says, wolfing down dinner three days after Sylvain has reappeared. 

Felix nods, vaguely stirring his stew. Ingrid frowns and swallows. 

“He does. It’s weird with you vanishing, you wouldn’t have done that if this happened before you two were together,” she adds. 

Felix sighs. “Yes. I just needed to think,” he says, voice on edge. Ingrid doesn’t begrudge him this though, he knows that. 

“He’s remembering more each day. You should go and see him,” she says, which is the point of this. 

“I will. I’m planning what to say,” he says. 

“You don’t need to. I know it’s different, I know you miss him. But you’ve never had to rehearse conversations before so don’t start now,” she replies sternly. 

Felix does huff a laugh at that for she is actually, entirely wrong. He’d rehearsed for at least an hour what to say after that brush with death and, more crucially, of a kiss on his ear. As while Sylvain had commented before his verbal abuse didn’t matter, this time he didn’t want to rely on someone else by-passing his lack of filter. 

They’d made him rest, despite that fact that magical healing is instantaneous and thorough, so he’d had hours alone to conjugate sentences into some rhythm that seemed passable. It is frustrating, though, this whole jangling of his senses, this fight or flight that should only be used in battle. Emotions should not warrant this type of scrutiny, and it’s a testimony to how close they are to the end of this war that this is breaking through. 

So he thinks, and hates that he’s thinking, and thinks some more. And of course, by the time Sylvain appears, smiles and bearing food, Felix has run his mind ragged in trying to think of a speech and has come up with nothing but annoyance and half formed ideas. 

Not good. Especially when Sylvain smiles and Felix feels like he’s going to be sick in a good way. Which is a horrendous new development. 

“I come bearing food, so spicy it will destroy anything nasty in your body from that rusty sword,” he says. 

“Thank you for the reminder,” Felix says, but food does sound good, and he assumes, that even in his turbulent state of mind, he still knows how to eat. 

“Feeding the injured, always a good idea,” Sylvain says in mock seriousness as Felix eats, only offering him a glare in return as he finishes the meal. 

“I want to leave,” he announces as soon as he’s done, and Sylvain snorts. 

“Of course you do. I’m sure you can tomorrow, we’ll be leaving here in the next few days anyway. Been a while since any of us almost died, let them fuss over you,” he says, smiling in that way which Felix knows means he’s enjoying this. 

He grunts. “I don’t need fussing over,” he says stiffly. 

“You sure? You seemed pretty keen on a hug when you were bleeding all over my lap.” 

Felix chokes on air, and feels his face heat, glaring as sharply as possible at Sylvain, whose smile grows with his reaction. The flush increases as Sylvain stands, moving closer. 

“Well, you technically did stay awake although you were pretty nonsensical, so I guess I owe you an actual hug. Can’t have you ruining my reputation by telling people my hugs are anything but spectacular.” 

In all this planning, he hadn’t anticipated the touch being given freely, but it was. Sylvain bends down, height difference even more apparent since he’s sitting in bed, and is just absorbed. No other word for it. His pain addled brain had been right, for Sylvain is warm, so much warmer then he thinks skin should be. Felix feels as if he’s being pulled into something so soft and easing, despite the fact that Sylvain’s clothes scratch on his skin and arms are all muscle and strength. 

They hugged as children but he cannot even recall that, it’s so long ago. Haltingly, he raises his own arms, watches them stop-start on their own way to wind around Sylvain’s shoulders. It pulls Sylvain closer by some force other than his own strength, and the warmth of his body scalds through his finger tips. 

He smells like leather and ash, a scent that probably merges into everything now, although it’s far better than blood. There’s also something he can’t categorize other than ‘Sylvain’, that’s he’s not realised until now has its own uniqueness. 

“See? My hugs are amazing.” 

Felix is broken from his reverie as he realises his face is in Sylvain’s neck and he’s clutching him rather than hugging which is just too much. He pulls back and the vibrations of uncertain cause his fingers to shake. 

Even more so when Sylvain retreats, and brushes a kiss to his forehead on the way, as fluid as a sword fight. And Felix’s heart jumps in his throat, as this time he’s not injured and possibly hallucinating, so he tips his head up and kisses Sylvain. 

Just once, he has to sort of push up to reach as Sylvain is moving away. But the action halts both of them, and to Felix’s surprise, Sylvain’s cheeks colour a little. 

“Well then, I think I can show you another thing I’m amazing at.” 

And he does. For so long that Felix’s mouth feels numb with something other than chill, a first kiss that becomes so many it cannot be counted. His limbs tingle with nervous energy that he’ll come to think of as part of the thrill of expectation, and he channels it into kissing until they’re caught and forced to part. 

Back in the present, that same jittery feeling hits him when he opens the door to the room Sylvain’s works in and sees that smile once more. It’s almost a reenactment of that early time, for Felix has been thinking for days of how to approach this, of what to say and how to act in the same way he did before. But now their roles are reversed, with Sylvain being the one in recovery while he is in search of him. He’s even brought food; Ingrid’s suggestion because who else would offer that, but he’ll take it. 

“Hey, I was wondering where you were,” Sylvain says, standing up from the books at the desk. 

Felix nods down at them. “Light reading?” 

Sylvain snorts. “Some magic meditation Mercie wants me to do try. Not really my forte, but if it helps, I’ll give it a go,” he says, stretching up and Felix’s eyes cannot help but track the strain and stretch of his muscles as they move under his shirt. 

He snaps his gaze back before he Sylvain can catch the look. A week of not being able to touch and feel Sylvain’s now familiar skin on the pads of his fingers hits him with so much force it shatters part of the cold stasis inside. He longs for warmth now, to be enclosed in those arms so suddenly it hurts like torture. 

This is hard, so much harder than he’d thought it would be. 

“That for me?” 

Felix almost jumps as Sylvain stands closer, and realises he’s been numbly holding out the bun in his hand. He finds his voice from the depths of his throat. 

“Yes. Just made,” he replies. 

“Nice! Do you remember when you stole these? You must have been, what, seven?” he says, taking a huge bite and grinning while chewing, which is revolting but so normal now that Felix barely shudders. Barely. 

“Yes. Your arm was broken,” he says with a shrug. He can still recall the day, trying to think of anything to stop Sylvain from feeling so bad, and seeing the sweet buns placed so carelessly in the kitchen was easy pickings. 

“Feed the injured, always a good plan,” he says, winking as he finishes off the last bite. 

Felix blinks, the familiar sentences stalling him. He wonders if he remembers, can grasp things are so fundamental to their relationship. But Sylvain turns away before he can fully contemplate. 

“You don’t happen to know what half of this means, do you? Seeing as your more the reason expert than me,” he says, reopening a book. 

Felix sighs. “And Mercedes is the actual expert.” 

Sylvain shrugs, still not looking at him. “But I asked you.” 

Felix doesn’t want to assign meaning to that, but does say yes, and spends the morning planning out a magical meditation that may or may not help. 

* * *

Sylvain remembers more. Battles, losses, strange pockets of happiness they had in between. It comes fast and unrelenting, but there are patches he struggles with. Months that are blank and hold significant political dates that he cannot recall. Others when he seems to remember things that just didn’t happen, his mind trying to join gaps by itself. 

“We’re here because the local merchants guild asked for help, right?” he says one evening when it’s storming, rain hammering against the windows. 

Ingrid’s face lights up. “Yes! We’ll be done in a moon, I think. Then onto...well, we haven’t thought of that yet,” she says, glancing at Felix. 

“I thought we were taking a break after this?” 

They both freeze at Sylvain’s words. For that is true, but it’s not all of them, it’s just he and Sylvain. They’d wanted time, as the year since they began their relationship approaches, to just be them for a while. Sylvain suggested it, been pretty strict on it as they needed their own time to heal and grow, as well as the rest of the world. 

A fonod memory, another beginning. Just as the autumn rains crept in, Sylvain sits down on a shipment of grain and just says: “we should run away.” 

Felix snorts. “Where exactly would you like to go,” he says, as he’s starting to sort the inventory. 

“Somewhere that isn’t raining. Where it’s warmer. Honestly, you wear a giant coat and you’re still not warm, I don’t think you’ll survive the winter,” he says and Felix rolls his eyes. 

“Yet I’ve done so every year.” 

There’s a pause as Felix check that number, only to jump a little when an arm wraps around his waist. 

“I just want to run away with you. Just you, no one else, just for a while,” he says, so close but devoid of the usual tantalizing flicker of a tongue on his skin that comes with words whispered.

The idea blooms inside him as the rain hammers down, of literal peace and quiet, anywhere, with just Sylvain for a time where they can block out all of the past and all of the future. He feels his mind clear and his limbs loosen just by the prospect, and he is both astounded and happy that Sylvain seems to know what he needs before he does. 

“Let’s do that then,” Felix says, throat oddly clogged. 

Sylvain tucks his head into Felix’s shoulder and just rests there, breathing him in, sharing their space. Perhaps that’s why he does it, why control gives way to rash thinking, this new found comfort of another person which sends his mind off kilter.

“I love you.”

Sylvain’s muscles lock out and squeeze hard it’s almost painful. When he speaks his voice is shaking. 

“I can’t believe you said that facing away from me, turn around and say it again,” he demands and Felix immediately digs his heels into the ground. 

“No.” 

There’s much shoving, elbowing and wrestling that’s messy for two trained experts in combat, but that hardly matters when moments later Felix is pressed against boxes and being kissed within an inch of his life. Sylvain parts every few seconds to tell him he loves him, again and again until Felix growls and tells him to stop talking so they can concentrate on one thing at a time. 

Recalling that now sends a heatwave of want and fear through Felix in equal parts, but both Ingrid and Sylvain are looking to him, so he has to reply. “Yes. That was the plan,” Felix says slowly, meeting Sylvain’s eyes. 

Sylvain smiles, looking relieved. “Okay, that I’m glad for, wasn’t sure if I’d just wanted to get out of here so much I was making it up.” 

Felix stands before he’s even aware, out of the room within a second, and slamming the door to his room before he can blink. 

It’s too much. It’s too much gone, and he’s shaking from the effort of keeping it all together. He’s tired and it’s cold and lost in this uncertainty. He gulps in frigid air and listens to the rain howl and crash outside, like the voices of the dead that haunt his footsteps. 

It’s all a nightmare. From the very start, that’s all this has ever been. 

He expects the knock but not the voice when it comes a few minutes later. 

“Can I talk to you?” Sylvain calls. 

Felix drops his head to his chest, turns around from where he’s been leaning against the door and opens it. Probably a little too hard, as Sylvain stumbles forward. 

“What did you want to talk about?” Felix asks, standing as best he can in the frame, not wanting Sylvain inside the room when he’s feeling this way. 

Sylvain doesn’t comment on it though, he takes a more sturdy position a safe distance away. 

“It’s hard to explain, I guess. I don’t remember much of recent events. But it’s...I know I’m missing things. Like a phantom limb I guess, there’s a big part of me not here but I can still feel it’s impact. And then I get...flashes,” he says, tipping his head to the side. 

Felix swallows. It feels loud. “Flashes?” 

“Yeah. Little things, they aren’t always right or make sense but...like just now. I remember asking you to run away with me.” 

Felix feels sick. Stronger than ever before he feels, the small amount of food he’s eating rise up and he fights not to just retch on his boots. But, adding to it all, Sylvain is not done. 

“It was raining. A bit like this. And you told me you loved me.” 

Felix grips the wood and ducks his head down, almost swinging with the emotion. He hasd no idea how this is going and what will happen now, but he looks back up and Sylvain is still watching him. 

“I did. I do,” he says, and his voice cracks on the ‘o’ so it sounds like a half sob. 

Sylvain’s expression softens and Felix’s heart beats because he knows what’s coming and it can’t be true, real, its-

“I know. Because I love you. And I don’t remember much else, or how it happened but I know that like I know my own name,” he says, and his voice is thick but he’s smiling as if it’s the first time once more. 

Felix grits his teeth, pushes off the door and throws himself forward. He’s not sure if Sylvain’s reactions kick in or he’s expecting it because he’s hauled up into those arms he’s missed incredibly. 

He sighs at the feel, mouth opening into a kiss that’s just a mess of longing and missed time, and he grips Sylvain’s hair hard, party just to shake his nerves and partly as a reminder that Sylvain likes that, and the hitching of breathe he gets in reply is worth it. 

Sylvain walks them into the room, but it’s a short lived uncoordinated movement, and Felix pulls away to slide back to the floor. His fingers trace Sylvain’s face as if it’s been years, not weeks since they were so close. 

Sylvain bows his head until their foreheads touch. 

“I don’t remember the first time we did that,” he mutters, arms enclosing Felix tightly as if he’ll vanish again like the memories. 

“I’d been stabbed, I kissed you once I was better,” Felix replies, for a summary will do. 

He feels Sylvain frown. “I don’t think I want to remember you being stabbed,” he says. 

“I complained about your hugs then,” Felix says, filter gone and forgotten, of no use now. 

Sylvain scoffs. “My hugs are amazing. Speaking of, you’re freezing,” he says, arms running up and down Felix’s back, the friction and feel causing him to shiver. 

“Keep me warm then,” he murmurs, leaning up as Sylvain crashes down, until there is no space for cold or doubt. 

The rain hammers all night as Felix tries to sleep, content in the chill for the first time in weeks with Sylvain breathing beside him. It is not quiet, there are still so many ghosts of the past to capture and chase, to help Sylvain return to as normal as can be. 

“Sleep,” Sylvain whispers against his temple, and Felix turns his head in the dark. 

“I’m trying,” he says, and a hand comes up run through his hair, feels all the length that now comes down to his back, only ever free and down when he rests. 

“Keep trying. I’m here. I love you,” Sylvain says, a promise, a vow that cannot be broken by sword or spell. 

A comfort that will do for now, when it’s all still so chaotic. A promise that they will grow, heal and live. Together. 

**Author's Note:**

> I have more Sylvix coming very soon! So find me on [Twitter](http://www.twitter.com/EnlacingL/) and [Tumblr](http://enlacinglineswrites.tumblr.com)


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